Hey Ty, I haven't checked in for a while. You've come a long way from when you ordered a BIC sub!
I'm a big fan of Rythmik, but the Hsu VTF-3 MK5 HP will be a clear step up in performance from the LV12-R. The internet direct subwoofer market is highly competitive and largely driven by forum word-of-mouth. Products that are overpriced, poor quality (or both) get found pretty quickly. So in this audio segment, price is a reasonably good indicator of overall performance.
You'll be very happy with the Hsu, it's arguably
the best bang for your buck sub in the world right now.
If you have setup questions, ask here on the subwoofer board or there's a very active thread over on AVS that Kevin from Hsu monitors.
Edit: Here's the thread (started by shadyJ):
http://www.avsforum.com/forum/113-subwoofers-bass-transducers/1701929-two-hsu-subwoofers-get-major-upgrades-vtf15h-mk2-vtf3-mk5-hp.html